My little eyes were glued. Moving pictures illuminated the room and poured flickering light into

my eyes, down my throat, and out my ears. No disturbance, no distraction, no desperate ploy

from an annoyed mother could pry my eyes from that screen. I was hooked.

But for just a moment, I let my eyes wander. A dimly lit room exposed my brother, my two

sisters, and my cousins huddled together on the cherry red couches that surrounded that

brilliant screen.

What a dark place the basement is,

I thought to myself.

As my eyes began their journey back to the moving picture, I heard something. It was the

clashing of hands in a foreboding audience, smacking together in one accord without even a

hint of praise--just loudness. It was the sound of a thousand large rats pounding their pittering

feet down the glossy-wooden stairs at the end of the hallway. It was the sound of the unknown. I

peered down the hallway with curious eyes to catch a glimpse of these unknown clashing hands

and roaring rats only to find terror rapidly manifest in my eyes.

A sickening, deep blackness of acid gushed from the stairs and down the hallway headed

straight for the cherry-red couches. My pounding heart yelled in my ears to move, jump, run,

something.

In the atom of a second, my brain joined in with my heart and slapped me with

reason:

Your little feet will burn away if you touch that liquid, run!

Fear gripped my feet and flung them off the red-cherry couch. Touching down a mere moment

before the blackened acid could burn my toes, my feet ran for the other end of the hallway

where the second set of stairs led upward towards my freedom. I reached the top of the stairs

where grey light peered through the grand windows on every wall, blinding my eyes for a

moment.

Strange how the light blinds me when all I want is to see.

My eyes took back their

focus and looked around for any sign of deep-rich acid infiltrating the house. Nothing.

Thud!

My head swung around at the sound of something hammering the front door window. I

stepped closer, narrowing in on the sight.

And then I saw it. I saw the rage of an endless monster boisterously ripping away the outside

world. Where sky and land met, I could not tell. All seemed black and grey and deep and loud

and it was consuming all life as my little eyes could tell. A peculiar humming sounded in my

eardrums and I could feel the monster sucking the air out of my lungs.

You’re trapped.

“You there? Hello? I’m losing signal... Yes, Joe, we are

trapped

at the Ranch... You’re

coming?? You’re coming?? The kids--” My mother’s voice faded as she braved herself down the

stairs and into the black acid below. My hands and feet sped after her, trembling and reaching

to stop her.

She’ll be burned! She’ll be burned!

“Mom!” My mouth echoed through the grey space.

But all that hung in the air was the drapery of roaring monsters and the faint echo of my

molasses please to my mother.